"The decision to place Switzerland on the Watch List this year is premised on U.S. concerns regarding specific difficulties in Switzerland’s system of online copyright protection and enforcement."

'Anti-piracy outfit Logistep built a reputation in the latter half of the last decade for providing tracking services for copyright trolls operating in Europe and the UK. However, things didn’t go entirely to plan. In 2010 following several years of legal action, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court ordered Logistep to stop harvesting the IP addresses of file-sharers. The Court ruled that IP addresses amount to private data, a decision that effectively outlawed the tracking of file-sharers in privacy-conscious Switzerland.

'This apparent lack of protection for rightsholders is unacceptable, the USTR says.

'“Six years have elapsed since the issuance of a decision by the Swiss Federal Supreme Court, which has been implemented to essentially deprive copyright holders in Switzerland of the means to enforce their rights against online infringers; enforcement is a critical element of providing meaningful IPR protection,” the report reads.

'According to the USTR, since 2010 Switzerland has also become an increasingly popular host country for many pirate sites, a position highlighted in the 2015 Notorious Markets review.'